Utility Week

Energy Sureground TM for haul roads will drive down carbon emissions before 2030 SAVING IN PROGRAMME TIME 67 % SAVING IN VEHICLE MOVEMENTS 70 % SAVING OF MATERIAL SENT TO LANDFILL 100 % SAVING IN CARBON EMISSIONS 60 % Soil Science are specialists in building cost-effective, low carbon, Haul Roads and Compounds for the construction industry. Sureground TM is our unique, reversible soil stabilisation solution, where all soil is retained on-site and used within the decommissioning process. It helps your project meet its emissions targets whilst saving you time and money. For the full story, visit our website, www.soilscienceltd.com or call 01344 741098 The statistics above are independently verified and from a C2A Works project in Amersham UK, for the client Affinity Water on behalf of Barhale. Area covered: 9476m 2 Overall project savings = 30% COULD SAVE YOU: We are established specialist contractors with a proven track record and a unique offer designed to help Water Utilities meet their carbon neutral target by 2030. Email: info@soilscienceltd.com Soil Science Limited @SoilScienceLtd SoilScience-utility-week-halfpage-land-final.indd 1 SoilScience-utility-week-halfpage-land-final.indd 1 05/06/2022 13:54 05/06/2022 13:54 in association with autumn when we expect the risks they are protecting consumers from will be adequately addressed by reforms to the price cap. Nevertheless, we will have the ability to extend each measure through next winter if signi cant." So Energy has been campaigning for a ban on exclu- sive tari• s for several years. Its co-founder Simon Oscro• says: "Exclusive tari• s o• ered on price comparison websites encourage a race to the bottom, in a really unhealthy way. Where its win win for those digitally engaged customers who constantly shop around but everyone else pays a little bit more. And a lot of those customers then end up being unhappy and inherently have to distrust suppliers because they're not getting transparent information. "How can we convince people to let us put up solar panels and control their devices when we can't even be straight with them on the most basic question of 'what is your cheapest tari• '?" Former regulator Stephen Littlechild is not in favour of the loyalty cap, saying it does not appear to be a prior- ity for most customers. He says: "If it's made obligatory on all suppliers to follow this model then you're basi- cally using regulation to impose a particular marketing approach that's been taken by a handful of companies at the expense of other suppliers, which doesn't seem to me a sensible way to go about creating a competitive market." He adds that the loyalty cap means customers would be deprived of any cheaper deals they might have had and would end up being worse o• , without any guaran- tee that loyal customers would be better o• . "Indeed, the CMA's judgement on Ofgem's previous attempts to assist less active customers suggests that a loyalty cap would reduce competition," he said. It's all relative Many suppliers, including Eon and So Energy, support a move in the short term to a relative as opposed to an absolute price cap. This was the model originally pro- posed by MP John Penrose, which would set a maximum mark-up between a supplier's best competitive price and their default tari• . He has since updated his proposal to include what he describes as an "emergency circuit breaker" which would set an absolute cap if wholesale prices rise or fall sharply in a set period of time. He points out there is now a live example of a relative price cap in the insurance market, where the FCA has introduced rules to end the practice of "price walking". This is an excerpt from the report of section headed "What does competition look like in the future?" Other sections include: • A ordability – the long-term view • Regulating for fairness • Wholesale market reform – sending all the right signals • Security of supply – moving beyond targets

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